add your winter wildlife pics in here

Here is a lil Red Tail Hawk that hangs out while I am moving round bales. Sometimes mice live under there and when I move the bale the mice take off.

The wife got the hawk pic from the drive way.

A few days ago day we went out looking for eagles. We got this pic near the house as well.

I can not remember if I had posted this before or not. Back in October the lil wife was out looking for anything to take a pic of and had a hawk come down and give her this shot.

The story on this shot can be found at

http://www.birdforum.net/gallery/showphoto.php/photo/233205

That's an excellent pic of a red tail. I have a few pics of them, but nothing like that. It's pretty impressive to see one swoop down and take a mourning dove, the dove just explodes.
I've seen them rip a rabbit in half in a matter of minutes. They also help keep the squirrel population down.

Not for long. I was in NF about 3 years ago, and I saw one black squirrel, two reds, and quite a few grays. Once grays get into an area they are larger, more aggressive, and more proliferous than the other species. They always kill them off and overbreed the area within a few generations.

This is a pic of a horse that got stuck in a pond on wednesday, about 4 miles down the road from me.


Here's a video of the rescue.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=990_1233865945

NF - meaning New Fairfield or is that just my brainlock on my hometown?? I have not seen any Blacks around but yes on the reds. Red squirrels are small and prefer conifers to live in - i think b/c of the cones and the small seeds to eat - but I could be wrong. Pootatuck Forest is a nice spot for red squirrels but I have not been hiking back there in a few years now.

^good save with that horse...my son and wife saved my Shepard when he got stuck in the icy pond a few years back. Smart dog he loves the pond but but now stays away when there's ice on it.


^That same dog chased a bunch of birds out of the cedar trees a few weeks ago into the freezing cold. We felt bad and started using the truck as an improvised feeder. Since we added sunflower seeds a few days ago more birds show up blue jays and...this wood pecker.Took a lot of shots of this beauty but the sumac cones get in the way. Anyone know what kind of wood pecker this is? thanks...


another view doesn't show it but that wood pecker is a tad bigger than a couple of resident crows that also show up daily. from a hundred feet away I'd say it 16-18" in length.

looks like a Pileated Woodpecker...wait till ya hear him hammerin' on a dead tree

'Pileated Woodpecker'...thanks RAY...now we know.

Nice woodpecker pics. Pileateds are kind of elusive around here and I rarely see them out in the open. I usually see them way up in a tree, after hearing them knock, or flying overhead while making a squawking sound.

The wife sez thanks.

As for that woodpecker, we have drove for miles to various places looking for that bird so she could get a picture of one and have not scored yet.

American Kestrel. He was just sitting on the power line, in front of the house today.

Lookin' for a Chickadee sandwich !

I live in Silicon Valley, so this is as wild as it is going to get:

This is the homeless cat that adopted us a couple years ago. She keeps the mice and lizard population in check in the backyard. She is sitting on my splitting round.

here's a couple from the rouge river in oregon.


being a camera novice these pic's were SURE A REAL TREAT.just swooped down and grabbed a fish !

Great Baldie shots!

Here's a photo I took of a Bald Eagle on a rural road in northern Michigan near the Mac bridge. There was some sort of road-kill splattered on the road. It was in such bad shape, I couldn't tell what sort of animal it had been. Bald Eagle sitting there in the middle of the road picking at it like a vulture. By the time I got my camera out, it flew up and sat on top of a tree for a moment, and then took off.

I can see why Ben Franklin did NOT want the Bald Eagle to represent the USA. He wanted the turkey, claiming the Bald Eagle was just a dressed-up vulture.

That second eagle shot is very nice.

These guys are pretty stupid, but they sure are good at finding food. Wife threw some popcorn out there yesterday.

Round here we call those turkey's "Land Carp"

It's funny this time of year they don't even run from cars. Try sneaking up to them in full camo and they are long gone.

The topic is WINTER wild life......green grass in the middle of winter....oh, California and Silicone Valley = green. It's all those computer chips.

Don't feel so bad. We haven't had much snow here but at least our grass is brown. :lol:

Very photogenic cat.

Some of my backyard visitors I caught with my trailcam. One is a rare piebald whitetail.

^It's really been snowing and blowing all morning here's a pic of a male cardinal and squirrel foraging for some seed I've been throwing up on my absent son's truck.

Too bad the shot doesn't show it brilliant color like the pic below ...as the bird patiently loiters in the howling wind for the squirrel to leave.

Never, ever before fed birds until last month. Last night we when to WalMart and got another bird feeder, we'll launch it later today. Got to say it's kind of neat feeling feeding the birds...they kind of depend on me.

Savage-

My sister gave me black oil sunflower seeds to put in my bird feeders as a Christmas present. I had fed them to squirrels in the past but never the birds. Well, those birds go nuts. I can't keep the feeder full enough. THe squirrels rummage around on the ground for all the seeds that the birds drop (I have feeders that are 'squirrel proof'). Have increased our bird population by 100% since adding them to their usual fare.

I also hang suet in a 'squirrel proof' feeder from our crab apple tree and the woodpeckers and flickers have a feast. I love sitting on our couch and watching all of them. Had a red tailed hawk fly in the other morning looking for a snack. All the birds were gone in a flash - only the squirrels brave enough to hang around when hawks make their rounds....

We have a great mom and pop feed store close by and they stock all sorts of seed for the critters. In the summer I get dove food and spread it on our drive. Have counted up to 30 morning doves feeding at a time. Now we just have 2 ring necked doves. Must have flown in early to get first dibs on a nesting spot.

Buying feeders gets expensive. I used to have 2....I now have 4 feeders and the suet 'box'. Had to buy a metal garbage can to store the food in - mice were helping themselves.... ;-P

This was yesterday - never saw a beaver out and about durning the winter before!